The Movie Was A Blockbuster
by silversheath
Summary: That awkward moment when the randomly paired girl you have to sit with is hot. Or That awkward moment when the movie can't even be filmed because you are Too Gay. But mostly The moment when you realize you can't look away from her smile.


"This is a great opportunity for you," her mother had said, and picked up her cell phone, fake nails clacking against the screen. Nozomi had leaned back in her chair; tried to touch her tongue to her nose. It hadn't worked.

"Being an extra in a movie? Hardly lofty," her father had said, and Nozomi had shrugged.

"I don't want to be an actress. I just want to get paid to do nothing, I think."

"You think too much," both of her parents had said together, and Nozomi had looked out the window of their mansion, at the clouds.

**

But that's a different story. Nozomi allows the hassled-looking people in charge – she thinks they're in charge? They wear badges and snap instructions into headsets; they're important somehow, anyhow – to chivy her around the crowded café set. All the civilians have been booted from the joint - it's filled with people who look like they could have been plucked from the streets, though.

"No logos on shirts," says someone from wardrobe to a man standing a little away from Nozomi. The man scowls, but stomps off to change.

Well, it's an easy job. Casually done hair in twintails, minimal makeup, act normal. Nozomi can do these things. There's a lot of waiting around as more people in headsets dart around, putting extras into tables and looking generally frazzled. Nozomi looks up at the clear skies – fresh sunlight dyes the little outdoor café a faint gold, sending rays like sunflowers across her face.

"Ma'am, just pick a table," says someone, and Nozomi finds herself gently pulled to a little two-seater near the door to the café. It's got a little vase with a single red rose in it, and the woman seating Nozomi leaves the moment she's down.

Cute. About five minutes later, more people are being placed around Nozomi, but she's yet to have a table partner. She pulls out a book – extra work is mostly sitting about. The stars of the show are still in makeup and hair, probably, so she doesn't expect much to happen. Technicians outfitted in black fiddle with microphones and cameras; a man with a box hits buttons. There's distracted chatter everywhere, and the warm sun is just… nice. It's nice, here.

"Where shall I go?" says a cool voice.

"Take any chair," responds a harried authority, and turns to deal with a chair that's fallen in the main flow of traffic.

"Mind if I sit here?" asks a woman with disinterest, and Nozomi looks up and blinks.

She gets words out of her mouth, at least. They're mechanic, glassy. "Of course not." The woman is _tall_ , has on a cerulean dress and heels straight from some upper-class fashion magazine. Nozomi pulls her long skirt around her legs and feels weird and matronly.

"I'm Nozomi."

"That's nice," says her table partner, and doesn't look inclined to speak after that.

Nozomi returns her gaze to her book, and the other woman sits awkwardly. She's fidgety, shuffling her tan legs and running her hands through her hair. Gosh, she's _pretty_ , but she's icy.

It's probably another five minutes before the woman says plaintively, "What's taking them so long?" Nozomi blinks.

"It can take hours to do one scene." She waves her book around a little. "Veteran extras always have something on hand. Have you never done this sort of gig before?"

Her table partner seems to be chewing her tongue. "No. I mean… no, I definitely haven't. I thought this would be an okay way to spend the weekend, I suppose. Maybe even get to see Yazawa Nico, or something." She seems to realize she's admitted to liking Yazawa films, because she flushes. "Not that this particular brand of trash is enjoyable."

Nozomi feels a grin slice across her face like she's located prey. "You into romance films?"

The other woman scowls, and Nozomi gets to see a flash of perfectly white canines behind flower-bright lips. "No!" A pause.

"Action, then?" Nozomi prods, and her new friend rolls her eyes. "Horror?"

"My name's Eli," interrupts the table mate, and brushes some strands of that fair hair behind her ears. "And yes, fine, I like these cheesy romance films." Nozomi waits, running her fingers along the spine of her now-closed nook. "Yazawa always does so _well_ , acting the childish girl who grows emotionally. I- if I were interested in acting, I'd study her."

"What are you interested in, Eli?" asks Nozomi, surprising herself with how much she enjoy the name rolling off her tongue. Eli blinks slowly, long lashes and bright red ears. She's not icy. She's a dork, pretending to be dangerous. Interesting.

Also interesting: Nozomi shifts in her chair, and Eli's gaze snaps down, watching Nozomi's legs move inside her skirt. Awesome.

"Alright everybody," calls someone through a megaphone, and the chatter and murmurs decline as Yazawa Nico and the male co-star stride on-set. A woman who is unmistakably the director intercepts them halfway through the café tables and starts talking animatedly. The megaphone-equipped man continues speaking. "We'll be setting up the microphone operators and cameras now. Remember to not look into the lens, and keep the volume way, _way_ down. Get ready."

Nozomi and Eli side-eye the director as she ushers Yazawa Nico and her love interest into the largest table center of the falsely-bustling café. The table is two away from them, but as the camera is setting up, Nozomi realizes they'll be directly in the background of the shot. For the entire scene.

She mentions this to Eli. "We'd better step up our game. They'll see us the whole time."

This might have been a mistake. Eli blushes harder than ever and blinks those feathery, pale lashes rapidly. "Are you nervous, Eli?"

"No." Another pause as Yazawa Nico herself slides into her table. A makeup assistant touches up the star's eyebrows in a last-minute check, and Eli sighs and sinks into her cushion, sliding bony fingers up into her hairline. "Yes. I've never…"

"Action!"

Nozomi observes as Eli falls into muteness. It's difficult being so _near_ to the main action of the scene. She wants to turn her head and watch the plot develop, but her duty is to act as if she's with Eli. So Nozomi allows Nico's soft, high voice to wash over and out, filtering away the words and focusing only on Eli's tapping fingernails. There's a trill of laughter like the alighting of a bird, and the sunlight bursts through in a dazzling specter of vermillion across Eli's face.

"Cut!"

Eli deflates. "This is…"

"Don't worry about it," says Nozomi as the director approaches Nico and starts doing something with her pigtails. "Do you want to make up a backstory for us, or something?"

"Us?" says Eli faintly, and the director motions for the scene to begin again.

"Sure," Nozomi says quietly, just enough for Eli to hear if she leans forward, pale collarbones visibly rigid in her blue dress. "We can be friends, best friends. From high school. We're meeting at the café today to catch up."

"Take two. Action!"

"Alright," Eli joins in, speaking at the same volume to add to the background chatter but not overshadow the main couple, ten feet away. "What did we do after school? That caused us to separate?"

Separate. Nozomi feels a twinge of nerves like a cold splash of rainwater. She doesn't _like_ that word. "Ah," she says, to stall, "I went straight into culinary school, probably. It was far from your university, where you studied management."

Eli raises one devastating eyebrow. "How did you know that I…?"

"Spiritual power," Nozomi says immediately to cover the fact that she guessed.

"Right. Are you actually interested in culinary pursuits, or is this just for the backstory?"

"I can make some good food," Nozomi defends herself quickly, one hand still on her hardcover. She puts her chin in the other, blinking slowly at Eli.

"Cut. Can we get the boom director out here?"

"What's your favorite dish to prepare?" Eli wants to know. She mirrors Nozomi's posture, the line of her jaw outlined like a sunset for one blazing second as the director fiddles with the lighting.

"Hot dogs," says Nozomi in English, and beams at the bemused expression she receives. To her utter astonishment Eli responds fluently; smoothly.

"Those always seemed disgusting to me. What are they truly made of?"

Nozomi gapes. "You speak English?" And so _well_ …

"And Chinese, and Russian," Eli adds sweetly, and grins at Nozomi's maximum flabbergastation. Her smile is wide and ideal, with the perfect balance of even teeth and full lips.

"How?"

"Let's try this again people, take three. Action." Nozomi wouldn't look about at what the other extras were doing even if she could tear her gaze from Eli's half-laughing mouth.

Eli touches the rose centerpiece with her straight nails, a gentle caress with the same care you'd give a newborn. "I lived with my grandmother in Russia until I was fifteen. Then I moved here. I studied English beginning at three, Chinese at about ten."

"Wow. You're… quadrilingual?" asks Nozomi, who has been counting on her fingers under the table.

"It's helpful." Eli's shy smile outshines the lighting.

"What do you use your skills for?"

"Well, I'm in the modeling business right now, but- ah, Nozomi? Are you alright?"

Nozomi had begun to choke on her own spit. Of _course_ this lovely woman with the elegant hands and shining eyes across the two feet of wooden table is a model. Of course. "Fine," she manages, and Eli blinks a little and smiles faintly, concern creasing along her forehead, lines like cracks in glass.

"I had been working a job with a French designer, but he dropped his tour in Japan. My agent thought some down time screening in movies might be entertaining while we continued to line up tasks." Her voice is considering, like someone turning a mirror back and forth, watching the fractured rainbows beam across and about.

"Action. Let's get this thing done, people!"

"Ah," says Nozomi, to keep the conversation going. Her thoughts are spinning like autumn leaves in a windstorm, gold and orange and a ruddy brownish _hope_ sliding out from the pile.

She mentally rakes them together in time to listen to Eli saying, "What do you do with your time, Nozomi?"

"Toujou Nozomi," she replies, because it feels nice to have her name slide out of Eli's mouth. "I'm… sort of between jobs. I don't do much, really. I sing! But you can't make a career out of that. I like to read. There's a park near my mans- my house, that I visit and watch the birds. I don't have a job, though. Not really. Being an extra isn't ideal for a full-time thing, you know?"

"Of course," says Eli. "Ayase Eli, by the way. It's nice to meet you, officially. That is." An oddly awkward pause – they actually shake hands across the table after Nozomi manages to extricate her hand from where it's clenched around her book. "You already know I model… hm. I sing, too, if I find the time to be alone. I read. Oh, don't tell anyone, but I do needlework." Nozomi has laughed. Eli frowns mockingly. "I do. I make quilts in my spare time. I… eat a lot of chocolate."

"Excellent," says Nozomi.

"I dance. Or I used to. There were some… complications, and I ended up just quitting. It made things easier, and it really opened me up for other opportunities."

Nozomi wants to ask, really does, but can't tell if it'd be horrendous and rude to pry, so she just says, "Like modeling."

"Yes. Like modeling, which I find I am passable at. I don't truly understand the industry yet, but I figure with a few more years of small gigs, I could make something of this."

"That's a good attitude," Nozomi says. "Very… sunny."

"Excuse me! Cut!" She doesn't even break eye contact with Eli until she hears the voice again. "Stop, damn it!" They look up to see… _the entire set staring at them_. Nozomi flushes, feels Eli moan softly in mortification from the back of her throat with all those eyes gazing towards them, because the director herself is stomping around Yazawa Nico's table and making a beeline for them. For Nozomi, dark eyes ablaze with irritation.

She has a sudden mental image of her father shaking his head. _God, Nozomi,_ he'd say if he saw her now, _you really can mess up anything, can't you_?

The director marches up to their table and scowls, bright scarlet hair falling in scraggles across her bony face. "What do you two think you're _doing_?"

"Um, sitting?" says Nozomi, and it's utterly possible Eli does not appreciate the snark in her tone, because the model flinches perceptibly. "I'm really sorry," she amends, and wow, the director is not kidding around, she's breathing so heavily.

"No. No, I don't care that you're _sitting_ ," she says.

Yazawa Nico, several feet away, makes the whole situation worse by twisting her graceful little hands and adding, "Come on, Maki, they're not doing anything. Leave them alone. Let's get back to _me._ "

"Yeah!" yells a slight woman from a chair that has **Producer** made out on the back in a huge purple rhinestone arrangement. "They're fine. Why are we stopping the scene?"

"Come on, Rin," says the director, annoyed. "Were you even looking up from your bowl at all?"

"No," says the producer, shamefaced. She recovers quickly and yells over the slow-rising buzz of the extras and crew, "but it sounded good!"

"Right, well, if you'd been paying attention you would definitely have noticed these two bozos stealing the show behind my stars," Maki says.

"We… what?" stammers Eli.

"Bozos?" asks Nozomi.

Maki puts one manicured hand over her eyes and takes a deep breath. "Drama queen," calls Rin from the sidelines.

"You two cannot sit here. You need to switch. Switch!" says Maki, and gestures impatiently at the two male extras sitting at a table farther away.

"We, what?" Eli tries again, and rises awkwardly as Maki shoves her bodily. Nozomi follows, confused. "What did we do?"

Maki sits them down, frowns. "I can't have you two so close looking at each other like that. It's distracting from the actual characters who are supposed to be the ones making eyes and looking like they're falling in love, not a couple of random extras."

Eli gapes. Nozomi begins to choke again.

"Well, that's a wrap," says Maki some time later. "We're going to move to the house confession scene. Let's get an hour and a half break, then meet on set five." Everyone starts to wander off. The extras aren't needed for this.

"So," Nozomi begins. They haven't moved from their out-of-the-way table. There's no rose on this one, but the sunlight is still warm on their faces. It smells, inexplicably, of baking cookies. Perhaps it's from the café in the background.

"Interesting," Eli agrees.

There's a moment of silence like a soaring high note, like angels hitting the perfect pitch in a chorus, and Nozomi's phone rings, a shrill scream that cuts the tension with a truly awkward rendition of _Wannabe._

She picks it up right before the Spice Girls start yelling I WANNA, I WANNA, and puts it to her ear, watching Eli pause indecisively in her chair, half-rising. Hopefully this will never be mentioned again. "Hello?"

"Good afternoon, Nozomi," her father's voice emanates from the speaker. It's tired, unimpressed. "Your mother and I wish to know when you'll be home tonight. She's had the chef buy some crab special from the pier stores."

Nozomi hesitates. Eli is standing, waiting in those sleek heels. Eli has a silver clutch in one hand and a nervous rhythm tapping against her thigh with the other. Eli is beautiful, no longer icy or impatient. Just a pretty girl. "Eli. What are you doing tonight?"

"Nothing much," she says, honesty in her voice. A slight tremor in her tone.

"Dad," Nozomi says into her receiver, eyes on Ayase Eli, who smiles back at her with the radiance of the sun bursting from the clouds Nozomi is already _so_ over watching, "I'll be out late."


End file.
